


The V. Letters

by BlueFloyd



Category: A Series of Unfortunate Events - Lemony Snicket, All the Wrong Questions - Lemony Snicket, Original Work
Genre: Last of the inked, Mistakes Murders and Misery, Of sides and confusion, Real Life Riddles and Challenges, Seasons of volunteering, VDC, dark themes, vfd
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-26
Updated: 2018-07-08
Packaged: 2019-01-05 16:37:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 8
Words: 6,118
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12193653
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlueFloyd/pseuds/BlueFloyd
Summary: The other half of the correspondance.Probably unreadable if you don't have all the background on our headcanons and self-inserts, but feel free to give it a go. It's dark, though.





	1. March, the 24th

**Author's Note:**

  * For [M (Beatrice_Sank)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beatrice_Sank/gifts).
  * Inspired by [The M. Letters](https://archiveofourown.org/works/8276495) by [M (Beatrice_Sank)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beatrice_Sank/pseuds/M). 



V.

Train station, platform B.

Push'd-Over-The-Edge.

March, the 24th.

 

My dear M.,

Once again, you were right. You do get a lovely view from the point of non-return. The sun is setting on Push'd, and as always in the hinterlands, the colors are wonderful. My train is coming in the distance, and the fumes from its steam engine rise in the purple sky, forming a pink cloud hovering over the gleaming steel of the train. It's quite a peaceful view, in its own mechanical and barren way.

You must be surprised of hearing from me after such a long time. Or did you doubted me far less that I doubted myself? After I had read the letters you wrote to me while I was in a coma, in an clinic, in an hostile town, I did not want to have anything more to do with you. I felt betrayed, I could not possibly understand how you could try and find excuses and explanations for the one who put me there. I still cannot, but it does not matter as much now. Your friendship and your assistance are far more important to me that any grudge.

For this is it, M. Waiting by my side, on an innocuous sheet of paper quite similar to the one I am writing this letter on, there is an employment contract, with only my signature missing on it. Once I'm finished stalling by writing self-referential letters to long time associates, I will sign it and become an employee of a corporation pushing long needles deep into the sea to extract a black liquid no matter the costs for the environment. Yes, this corporation.

You know the story with the girl who went deep undercover for forty years, living by the side of the monster she had vowed to kill, showing him a caring and compassionnate face, until the moment to strike presented itself, and although she seized it, she could not quite be certain anymore if she was a special agent undercover or a conservative housewife? The story you liked so much that you overlooked the commonplace evil below the glamorous character? Well apart from the mansions and the explosions and the Altons, I feel quite like this modern days Lorenzaccio. A year in the belly of the beast is quite a long time, and there's no telling how much of the mask will stick to my skin. There are some slow burning infernos that you do not get to walk through uncharred, and since the scars are certain, all I can hope for is that I am not left with a compulsion to fiddle with matchsticks once this catabasis will have reached its end.

So when all (and I to begin with) seems quite lost, you are the one I turn to. For if I do not take the time, here and now, to fill some gaping holes in the recollection of last summer events, there is a fair chance I will never get to. "It has been such a long summer", you wrote. It seemed so short to me. It was a summer of innocence, it was a summer where all the uglinesses we uncovered could be defeated simply by being exposed to the gentle and warm touch of the sun. It was a summer of adventures and excitment, when safety and moral purity were always a last minute escape away. It was a summer to be shared with three cousins and a dog. It was a summer with an implicit promise to never end. And yet here we are, a coma, an autumn and a winter later, on the dawn of what could be the spring of my downfall. I survived the coldest winter of my life, but if I am to have the slightest chance to go through the coming corporate four seasons, I cannot afford to harbor an irrationnal grief towards you. So here it will be, in epistolary form, my naked truth about what went on last summer.

The train is pulling in the station and I must imperatively leave Push'd today. I have to stop writing now and post this letter and the contract, but rest assured, more letters will follow.

 

Your friend and fellow volunteer,

V.


	2. March, the 27th

V.

Regional Train 220604, car 12, seat 54.

The Hinterlands.

March, the 27th.

 

My dear M.,

It was your birthday. After months of silence I send you a letter on your birthday and I forget to mention it. I am so sorry. I did not plan to write this second letter so soon after the first one, but I feel I need to make up for this missed birthday. When we were living at the Mortmain Headquarters, you used to ask me for a story on your birthday. "There's no greatest gift that the gift of imagination, and I'll settle for nothing less than greatness. So consider yourself prompted!", you emphatically told me once. I remember it vividly. Actually , I remember every bit of our training days, those where some of my happiest days. I think you already know that, but just in case.

You can consider these letters as your birthday story. For as truthful as I will write them, they will tell but the tale of our lives, through the deforming lens of my particular perception. There, I am getting lyrical again, I know it annoys you but it seems as I cannot stop myself as soon as a pen is put in my hand.

Here goes your story. It began in a train, quite similar to the one I am writing from. Actually, since the train ride was particularly uneventful, let's say the story began as I boarded off the train in a sealess seaside town that we have both come to know considerably more than we would have liked. With my suitcase in my hand, I walked down the streets until I reached the Black Cat Coffee. I had some time before meeting my local contact, and I wanted to see the place and taste the coffee. It was quite like I had imagined it. The place was devoid of customers, just as in L.'s stories. It could have looked sinister, but the music was cheerful and the day was warm and bright, so at the time it seemed like a place where the world was peaceful. The coffee with a hint of acidness, just as I came to like it during my mission in Nairobi. (the only other place where I tasted a coffee with this particular favor was on a street market in London, where I went to visit my brother when he was on a mission here and needed an associate with skills of both lockpicking and tunnel crawling. We ultimately did not lockpick anything and I suspect he said it was a needed skill so that I would be the only volunteer fitting the profile and we would get some time together, but he would rather drop dead than admit to this kind of sentimentality. Anyway, the time I got to spend with him was lovely, the coffee on the street market was great and this disgression is reaching its end.)

I was finishing my cup when a man entered the coffee. He sat by my side and told me: "Young girl, have you been good to your mother?". I gave the appropriate answer and put my cup down. He nodded, stood up and walked out of the coffee. I picked up my suitcase and followed him, assuming he was my contact arrived early. We climbed into a car parked a block away from the coffee. The drive was silent, which was totally fine by me. We soon left the heart of the city behind us and entered the slums around. You've seen them yourself, so I will not try to outdescribe them, you made a perfect job of depicting the squalor. We stopped in front of one of the many would-be houses. My guide entered it, so I followed. It was one small room. Five planks pretending to be four walls and a roof. The only light was coming through the holes in the curtain acting as a door. There was a bed, a fireplace, a chipped water pitcher and two glasses on the floor by the fireplace, and that was it. He crawled under the bed, rummaged for a while and got up, holding a box.

I took it and opened it. There was a gun inside. "I don't understand", I said. "It's good. Check it. It's good." I checked the gun, not knowing what to do. It was indeed in working order, with even a bullet in the chamber. "It's working alright, but what would I need a gun for?" "I don't know, I don't know, I am silent, just the money please, and you go, I have never seen you." It was starting to dawn on me that maybe that man was not my contact after all, but before the thought was fully formed, my mouth was already saying "What money? It never was question of money. . . " A look of desperation appeared on the man's face. "The money! I need the money!" He jumped at me. I do not even know what he was trying to do. To strangle me? To reach for my wallet? All I know is that we both fell to the ground, a shot was fired, the man was on the ground with blood oozing from his belly, and the gun was in my hand.

We're reaching the next station and I have some business here. I end this letter here so that I can left it in the train and have it reaching the city. I shall resume writing as soon as I can.

 

Your friend and fellow volunteer,

V.


	3. April, the 2nd

V.

Greyhound 220403, seat 21

The Hinterlands

April, the 2nd.

 

My dear M.,

The seamstresses in Peruggia were quite efficient, and I now own a tailored suit which will be much needed in my year to come (or if I am getting married, but let's hope not too many tramplings of my values are headed this way). I am on the road again. I cannot let my future get information about my past, these days even less than usually, and I hope taking the long way home will be enough to discourage any attempts at rewinding my trails.

To get back to events past, there I was, with the wounded man. I was in shock. Of course I had seen and even sewn wounds during our training, but it was the first time I was directly responsible for such a big one. I went to the man but he seemed to have fainted. I tore his clothes to look at the wound. It was bad. I had an emergency kit in my luggage, I used it to clean and bandage the wound. The man did not wake up. I searched the shack, but found no clues to help me understand the situation better. I could not bring the man to an hospital, all sort of questions would be asked. I went back outside. There had been some signs of activities when we had arrived, but now, the street was completely dead. The inhabitants of the neighbourhood seemed to know better that being curious when they heard a gunshot. The town was miles away. The man had no wallet but I had found the car key while searching him. All well and good, except that I did not know how to drive. After some hesitation, I went and lockpicked a nearby bike, closing the lock on the carkey as payment. I went back into the shack and gave the man an antalgic. And then I biked back to the town, in the afternoon heat.

I realised halfway through the ride that the gun was still in my pocket, so I stopped, cleaned it and threw it in a sewage drain. I threw the bullets in a garbage bin later. I arrived back at the Black Cat Coffee as the afternoon was turning into the evening. It was as desert as the rest of the town. I was exhausted, sunburnt, my clothes were a mess, my suitcase seemed to weight a ton, and I had no idea what to do next. I waited there an hour but no one showed up. My thirst was getting worst and coffee did nothing to quench it, so I resolved to leave the place. I left a coded note in case my contact arrived during the night, and resolved to find an hotel. Outside the air had begun to cool, and some people were in the streets. I walked directionless until I saw an "HOTEL" sign. I stumbled into the building and asked for a room and a meal brought to it. Once alone, I showered, cleaned my clothes as much as I could, ate and crashed on the bed.

I slept for nine hours straight, something I never do. I woke up around six o'clock. My clothes were almost dry and the sun was already rising. I had not closed the curtains in the evening, and I suppose the light woke me. I paced back and forth in my room, trying to make sense from the events of the previous day. I had missed my contact. That much was sure, and that was the important part. The rest was someone else's story in which I had got mixed, and I decided not to get mixed any further. I would go back to the coffee and hope that my contact would try and reach me today.

I got up, checked to content of my suitcase - especially the brown and heavy package - put on my still slightly damp clothes, and went down. I paid my note at the desk and went outside. The air was already warm and the walk to the coffee was enough to dry my clothes. The place was still desert. I took a seat at the counter, got a coffee from the machine and resumed my reading of Returning to Reims. A few people entered the coffee through the morning, but none of them ushered the passphrase. They merely bought a coffee or a loaf of bread. I lunched of such a loaf, too anxious to got outside and risk missing my contact again. I had trouble reading, for I was looking at each person entering or just passing by the coffee. Moreover, as much as I wanted to focus on my mission, I could not stop thinking about the man from the previous day. I gave up reading shortly after lunch and just waited as the afternoon went by.

As the skies were darkening around Stain'd, I had no choice but to admit that my contact did not came that day either. I exited the coffee and went back to the same hotel. I ate in my room again, but this time my idea were clearer. My contact was gone and my window of opportunity was closing fast. The body in the slums could be found at any moment and anyway I could not delay providing him proper medical attention much longer. I had no guarrantees that no one had seen me with him. I had to act fast and get out of Stain'd as soon as I could.

My hand is getting sore and this is a place as good as any to have a narrative break, so I will end this letter here. It is the middle of the night anyway and I seem to be the only one still awake in this bus. It is strange, reminiscing my time in Stain'd. On the moment, I felt like I had no time to think, and I just realize now by writing it that I spent a whole day reading and waiting. Had I thought instead, things would have gone quite differently I suppose. But I was quite distraught by the way events where unfolding and acted on impulses, to say the least.

Ok, I will stop here for real now.

 

Your friend and fellow volunteer,

V.


	4. April, the 6th

V.  
A courtyard bathed in sunlight,  
Dolgoffgrad

April, the 6th.

 

My dear M.,

It is T.'s birthday today. This one I did not forget. Small victories, you could say. I had to stop my travelling for a few days, a local injustice that I could not let go by. I tried to help. I provided moral support and good advices to the wronged party. I am not sure it did any meaningful difference in the end, but I can hope. Moreover, it made me encounter someone willing to let me ride along in their car until my next stop, which can only help scrambling my trail a bit more. Do you find it ever weary to give false names to the people you meet? There was a time when it amused me, always being in disguise. It is not as such nowadays. If I still lie easily to my enemies, lying to the people I appreciate is getting burdensome as I grow older.

The sun here in Dolgoffgrad is as bright and unforgiving as it was in Stain'd when I was there. What plotting can you achieve under such a blazing light? Any attempt at deception is crushed flat. Yet Stain'd is not known for its lack of deception and plotting. I suppose people make up for the lost hours of the days during the nights. And that was what I was about to do. So far, I had only known Stain'd days, but I was entering its night life, as I would have done from the beginning if everything had gone as supposed. I waited in my room for the skies to be properly black, and then I donned dark and practical clothes, removed the brown package from my suitcase and exited the room through the window. I climbed down the gutter and found myself in the back alley of the hotel. I had parked the bike here, away from prying eyes, and there it still was. I grabbed it and started riding through the night. I biked until I reached the slums. I went back to the house of the man I had shot. The car was gone. I entered the room. The man was still laying on the bed. I feared he had died but no, he was still breathing, and seemed not to have awaken (which was good for me, he could not identify me this way). I tried to make him drink some water, with little success. I resolved to drop him in front of the clinic as soon as I was done with my business in Stain'd.

I knew where to find E. I had not completely trusted my contact, as I suppose you did not completely trusted yours when you met her yourself, and I had gathered intel on her approximative whereabouts from other sources. Being introduced through a local fixer was a way of being polite, but since this venue was closed, I had to improvise. I knew she usually met the people she accepted to see on the cliffs towering above the former sea. Giving the differents spots where she used to wander, and several other clues, I suspected she lived in one of three houses built directly below the cliffs. I biked there. All three houses were silent with no light on. I had no way of knowing which one was E., but it struck me as odd that she would not be awake so early in the night. No one who has been in our kind of business is an early sleeper. Had I been wrong about her whereabouts? A light shone on the cliff. That was more like it. She had gone out for a midnight stroll, saving me the trouble of breaking into her house. Plus, it would probably appear friendlier not to.

I climbed the steep steps going up the cliff. Soon I found myself on the plateau above. I went in the general direction the light had been. And there she was indeed. I made a point of being noisy and visible as I approached. "Yes, I know you are here. What do you want?".

You cannot imagine how frustrating it is. I tried time and time again to remember. To get even the faintest idea. But nothing. This moment in my life is forever hidden from me. I supposed I could ask her how the conversation went, but I do not see this happenning, neither do I see myself trusting anything she would say. They say that kind of trauma is known to cause memory loss, and it does not surprise me. Falling from twenty-five meters tends to do funny things to brain functions. My next memory is the middle of a conversation with a nurse at Colophon Clinic, so I have a bit of anterograde amnesia as well. Isn't this great? I cannot say how the conversation with E. went, but I know there is no way in hell that I would have fallen on my own. She took the part of the statue I had and gave me an eight week-coma in exchange. It took some more time for me to be able to walk again, time during which the world passed me by. I hated it. I hated E. Now I have other matters on my mind and I am not so fierce about all this, but still I am not too keen on the subject. You defending her hurt me. Even if can see the how and the why, even if I understand that me imposing on her and coming by unannounced must have startled her to no end, still I cannot bring myself to think that all is well and that really, mistakes were equally made on both sides.

Anyway. All of this is behind us. You got the figurine back, you got some more intel and you got not to be pushed of a cliff ; in the end it is what matters. Recalling these events worked me up more that I would have thought so I'll end this letter here and go for a walk.

 

 

Take care,

Your friend and fellow volunteer,

V.


	5. April, the 14th

V.  
A regional train again, car 6, seat 17  
The Hinterlands

April, the 14th.

 

 

My dear M.,

 

On the move again. I have a suit, I have a tie, I have confirmation that my signed contract has reached the corporation's lawyers. The game is almost afoot. I must hurry and finish this story will there is still time.

Once I was out of my coma, it took several weeks before I was able to walk again. I had to use a cane at first. Painful seances of reeducation paid off, and I can do without now (but I will probably need one again if I ever reach old age). Finally, I was let out of the clinic, or rather I let myself out a few days earlier than planned, not trusting the place, the doctors, the nurses or anyone, really. My first moment out was dizzying. I had left during the day, as it is more discreet to exit an hospital in daylight than in the quiet of the night (one of the many differences between an hospital and a bank vault). Eleven weeks had passed since I had walked these streets, but I was unconscious for eight of them. The sun was still blazing in the sky, but it was not as hot. There were people out, even in the middle of the afternoon. It was not autumn already, but it was not summer anymore. It was an uncertain season somewhere in between, announcing changes without delivering them yet.

I had very few things with me. The figurine was gone, of course. the rest of my belongings had disappeared somewhen during my coma. I had noticed the signs of your passage (for which I still have to thank you, so here: thank you for your passage). I had found your ten first letters hidden under the floorboard, with the lockpick kit (that was such a delicate thing to do, was it you or H.? Anyway, thanks, it came in handy several times since). I had your letters, the kit, the clothes I was wearing, some money I had borrowed from a rather annoying doctor, and that was about it.

I lockpicked a bike, and I rode from the Clinic to the slums. It was exhausting, the lack of exercise during the coma had put me in a pretty bad shape. Still I did it. It took me some time to find back the shack of my non-guide. There was no body on the bed, and a makeshift table that was not here the previous time. I left. I biked back into town. The sun was once more setting on Stain'd by the time I arrived. I put the bike back where I had borrowed it. There was nothing left for me to do in this town. I walked to the station and boarded the evening train. I did not go back to Stain'd since, nor do I intend to until the day I die.

In the train carrying me away, I suffered a panick attack. The only one I ever had. I was a mess. I felt abandoned by the whole world. My coma, the man I shot, you finding excuses for E. and probably a few other unconscious issues, it was all too much. When I recovered from the attack, I decided I needed a break from volunteering, one during when I would be conscious. I traveled. Some times in the Hinterlands, some times abroad. I did not went back to the City, I did not contact VFD, I did not spend too much time in the same place and I avoided dabbling in anything shady, mysterious or enigmatic. I worked an odd job as a part-time accountant in a small shop selling gardening tools. I took on surfing. I drank too much, I partied until the sun was up, I woke up late, I pretented not to see that summer was fleeting and I tried to wish it back into business.

Overall, it helped me. Some of the damages Stain'd inflicted on me started to heal. I found a measure of peace in this day-to-day life. I did not want it to end, even if I did not see how it could go on much longer once the summer gone for good, nor if I could really hide from the world. But I decided not to address these issues before they were no longer evitable. I went on with my blissful life and my personal indian summer. And then as November was ending, my brother send me a message through our private channel. "Dad's dead."

~~I took the first train to the City. There was nothing else to do. The ride went in a blu~~

Sorry, I think I will have to wait until tomorrow to keep on writing. Some events are best kept to daytime recollection.

 

 

Your friend and fellow volunteer,

V.


	6. April, the 15th

V.  
Same train, same car, same place  
The Hinterlands.

 

April, the 15th.

 

My dear M.,

This train is taking me to Pankhusrt, where I will get shoes and a belt to go with the rest of my suit. The last part of my disguise. It is quite far away from the other towns I shopped in, but since I have to make some detours, I may as well get the finest items I can along the way. I should arrive there in the late afternoon, just in time to got and visit the shop before closing time. By paying extra I will have the shoes ready by tomorrow afternoon. Then I can head back straight to the City and be there by the 18th to start my undercover job.

But I digress. I have a story to finish, as painful as it is. As I started writing yesterday, the journey back to the city was a blur. It felt unreal. I had been in contact with my brother and got more details. I arrived at the city station and - bless him - T. was here. He stayed with me through the family gatherings, and I think he made sure C., R. and I were safe and able to grieve without any VFD interferences.

Grief is a funny thing. You think you have it under control and the sight of a box of pastels suddenly bring you to tears. I discussed this with C. The fact that this would shape our lives and the way we see ourselves, the fact that 55 years will be a milestone in our existence. I tried to find a reason, a hidden plot, a last message with a double meaning. Those are circumstances that make you beg for straightforward explanations and people to hold responsible. But there was nothing. No heroic sacrifice, no horrible blackmail, no revenge, no disquised murder. My father never had anything to do with VFD and he did not get involved at the last moment. It was just an untold history of depression, an unability to see how much he was loved, that got him. I am certain of this, for with C., we had an uneasy (and temporary) truce with R., and I do not think anyone could stay hidden from the three of us and our associates working together.

Anyway, being back in the city made me realise I could not stay away from my past and VFD. They meant too much to me. Having you and our other associates helping me for the painting job before the funeral and being there during the ceremony was much needed and I do not think I have said enough how much I appreciated it. Even if B. is an idiot with deeply problematic views of what a family is, by introducing C., R. and me to VFD, she did connect us to a family. Not one that would replace the first one as she had thought, but a seconde one, caring and sharing, in its own twisted, dark and secrets-loving way.

Taking care of the succession and of my own emotions took some time and I did not went back to volunteering right away. It took me some more time to decide what I wanted to do, how, and to figure out an acceptable plan of my infiltration of the corporation. I stayed silent on the VFD channels during this time to maximise my chances of a successful infiltration. But there I am. Everything is ready (minus the shoes business, but by this time tomorrow it will be taken care of). I took the long way around in my mind too, to realize (or admit to myself?) that VFD was my calling, whatever the risks, the betrayals and the disappointments.

I clung to summer as long as I could. Autumn was rough and winter was horrible, but a second spring of my volunteering is upon me, and who knows? It might even give birth to a second summer.

 

Your friend and fellow volunteer,  
V.


	7. April, the 16th

V.

 

April, the 16th.

 

Emma,

 

This is indeed not a pocket universe. This is a gigantic, messed-up, scary, full-grown universe, but we are not alone in it, for better and for worse.

This is an universe with thousands of intertwined stories, and sometimes you bump into strangers thinking they are your contact, and sometimes you get thrown of a cliff, and sometimes you wish there would be poison darts for it would help you make sense of it all. But some other times friends offer you a lockpick kit, help you go through a dreadful day or write you 10 000 words-long stories.

You are someone I care about, even if I sometimes forget to show it. Those seven letters should help closing the gap I stupidly dug between us. Our path of true neutrality in this schism is not an easy one to walk, but it is the one we must walk, especially when we create the path by walking it. More will come and walk in our footsteps, for we will have proven it is possible to do so.

When all is said and done, we have each other, a growing network of associates, and that deep sense of satisfaction when we find the solution of an enigma or demonstrate that what was thought impossible is actually feasible.

And surely, that must count for something.

 

Your friend and fellow volunteer,

 

Victor Dewey Cirhen.


	8. July the 1st, one year Later

V.  
Hawkins  
The Hinterlands.

July the 1st.

My dear M.,

Life sometimes takes some strange and unexpected turns. The clock of my corporate year went full circle and yet here I am still, a badge with the logo of Ink Inc. below my name, claming my renewed attachment to this company. What happened? Why didn't I run away as soon as I could, secret knowledge, confidendatial documents and blueprints tucked away in my briefcase, ready to be delivered to Bluetruce or to be used for a VFD scheme?

Well, as everything always is, it's complicated. I haven't fallen for _Ink inc._ propaganda, its proclamation that they are there because the world need them. Maybe I should have started this letter by restating this. I still hold the same views on the company as a whole, but I've discovered good people inside. Unexepected associates, companions of misfortune also trying to shift the course of the Leviathan, as futile as it may seem. The job itself had interesting parts, and the company did not offer to reconduct my post, but even better, to give me another assignment without the most boring parts of the one I held, and instead more freedom, more power (but of course they lure you in with the illusion of power, will you say). Even if it means to keep on working for Ink inc. for a bit, it's hard to say no to such an offer, especially when it's the only one you got. Also, it's in one of their research center. One with a megacomputer, high security laboratories and an accreditation from State Security. There must be some interesting and stranger things to discover here.

That research center is not in the city. So I moved away from the City. With joy. I do not have to pass by the statue of Triumphing Finance everyday to go to work, thanks the gods. I moved to southern reaches, ironically not to far from Stain'd, but more into the Hinterlands. The town is beautiful in its own ways. It looks a bit like the country colonized itself, with colonial architecture, huge walkways, lush vegetation, abandoned buildings speaking of a busier, more industrial past. And the mountains, M, the mountains. A beautiful succession of peaks and valleys visible in the distance, that looks like something out of a videogame scenery. Some days when the air is clear, they seems so close and I must fight off an urgency to drop everything, put on a green suit and just go and climb them.  
Did you know this is where my mother was born? One could say this was a homecoming, one a generation in the waiting.

Finally, the place I'm staying at. A flat in the center of the city, that I share with four associates. There still some work to do to make them see the world our way, but they are VFD material. A dentist, a pharmacologist, a nurse and a barmaid. Just enumerating it makes you feel the potential for turning them into a ragtag band of misfits. Add a gardener, and you got yourself an unlikely Club of Five, ready to right whatever wrongs come our way. They've been most helpful when I first arrived and needed to discover the town, and since they will all move out during the coming year, I already know I will miss them dearly.

Rumour has it you too will move away from the city by the end of the summer. Going overseas in pursuit of fleeting knowledge, poring over dusty manuscripts in sun filled libraries surrounded by crimson maple trees? That seems quite nice. And I'm sure getting away from the politics of the City's academia will do you some good. Take care of yourself, take care of O. (especially if you end up flatsharing), enjoy your time there and don't forget to come back, it's easy and tempting to get lost in the immensity of the forests over there, but remember that you are needed and loved here.

 

 

Your friend and fellow volunteer,

 

V.


End file.
